The départements (or departments) are administrative units of France, roughly analogous to British counties and now grouped into 22 metropolitan and four overseas régions. They were created on January 15, 1790 by the Constituent Assembly to replace the country's former provinces with a more rational structure. Most are named after the area's principal river(s) or other physical features.

Each département is administered by a Conseil Général[?] elected for six years, and by a préfet[?] appointed by the French government and assisted by one or more sous-préfets[?] based in district centres outside the departmental capital. An administrative reform in 1982 transferred some of the préfets powers to the president of the Conseil Général.

The capital city of a département bears the title of préfecture. Départements are divided into one to five arrondissements. The capital city of an arrondissement is called the sous-préfecture. The civil servant in charge is the sous-préfet.

The départements sub-divide into communes, governed by municipal councils. France (as of 1999) had 36,779 communes.

Most of the départements have an area of around 4000-8000 km² and a population between 250,000 and a million. The largest in terms of area is Gironde (10,000 km²) and the smallest the city of Paris (105 km² excluding the suburbs, now organised in adjacent départements). The most populous is Nord (2,550,000) and the least populous Lozère (74,000).

The overseas departments are former colonies outside France that now enjoy a status similar to European or metropolitan France. They can be considered to be a part of France (and of the EU), rather than dependent territories and and each of them constitutes a région at the same time.